Hal Foster’s Prince Valiant is an undisputed masterpiece of comics art- painstakingly researched and illustrated. Foster spent more than 50 hours a week crafting every Sunday page. It is no wonder that legendary comics artists such as Jack Kirby, Alex Raymond, Frank Frazetta, Joe Kubert, Gil Kane, Wally Wood, Jim Steranko and dozens more admired, respected and studied his pages. Foster was and remains an artist’s artist, which is why he is in five artistic Halls of Fame — more than any other cartoonist or illustrator. Each one of his Sunday pages stands as a
testament to the unparalleled beauty of visual narrative art.

Fantagraphics’ recent reprints of the Prince Valiant strip, scanned from original color engraver’s proof sheets, have received international acclaim, and now we are printing the Holy Grail of comics art. Hal Foster’s Prince Valiant Artist’s Edition is a 192-page collection scanned from Foster‘s original pages and printed in full color, capturing every nuance of Foster‘s masterly brush strokes. Each page is so rare that the sum total of the original art reprinted in this book would likely cost millions. From Foster‘s very first Prince Valiant page to his very last the public will be treated to a selection of some of the most iconic and beautiful comic art ever made.

$200.00 Hardcover

Comics & Graphic Novels / Fantasy

192 pages, full-color, 17″ x 23 1/4″

Territory: E ● CQ: 1

ISBN 978-1-60699-897-7

That’s an astounding size, but not actual size of the artwork: searching auctions show Foster’s originals were usually about 26″ x 34″. From the last sentence it sounds like this will be a single volume. Based on the book’s title this is the first in a new line of original art books from Fantagraphics. This is a preliminary catalog page but it’s interesting to see the book called Hal Foster’s Prince Valiant Artist’s Edition in the last paragraph: we all know where the inspiration comes from. October can’t come soon enough!

2 Comments

Breaking news indeed. Thanks for the tip-off. This should be incredible. I have collected the newspaper pages since the sixties and have most by now. I used to bike down to the local liquor store each Sunday to buy the out-of-town San Francisco Chronicle…I lived in San Jose then…just to get my PV fix.

But I’ve never owned a Foster original page…always beyond my means.

A former partner and friend once owned the famous fight on the arched bridge, with the Singing Sword doing its business. I sold one with Val in Rome, in a chariot, from 1951…but it was not mine, just on consignment. It went for $12,000+ several years ago. Just one page. Not one of the most revered. But it was GREAT. To think he did that EVERY week for THIRTY years…